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The Spatial Memory Game: Testing the Relationship Between Spatial Language, Object Knowledge, and Spatial Cognition
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Spatial Language and the Embedded Listener Model in Parents' Input to Children
Katrina Ferrara1, Malena Silva1, Colin Wilson1
1Department of Cognitive Science, Johns Hopkins University.
Cognitive Science
|January 1, 2016
Summary
Parents adapt their spatial language to match their young children's understanding, demonstrating an embedded listener model. This adaptation was not observed when speaking to children with severe spatial impairments.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Science
- Developmental Psychology
- Linguistics
Background:
- Effective communication relies on speakers adjusting their language to listeners' knowledge.
- An embedded listener model suggests speakers use an internal representation of the listener's knowledge.
- Spatial language provides a domain to investigate this model in parent-child interactions.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate if parents utilize an embedded listener model when describing spatial relations to their children.
- To determine if parents' spatial descriptions are sensitive to their children's level of spatial language understanding.
- To examine this phenomenon in typically developing children and children with spatial impairments.
Main Methods:
- Parents described spatial arrays to either their 3-4-year-old children or an adult experimenter.
- Stimuli required encoding spatial relationships for target identification.
- Parental descriptions were analyzed for sensitivity to the listener's spatial language level.
Main Results:
- Parents of 3-4-year-olds tailored their spatial descriptions to their children's language level.
- These descriptions differed significantly from those given to adult listeners.
- Parents of children with Williams syndrome showed less sensitivity to their children's spatial language level.
Conclusions:
- Evidence supports the existence of an embedded listener model in spatial language.
- Parental ability to model listener knowledge is influenced by the listener's cognitive and linguistic abilities.
- Spatial impairments may present challenges for developing and utilizing an embedded listener model.
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